Long Range Patrol: A Novel of Vietnam (The Jim Hollister Trilogy Book 1)

by Dennis Foley

  Michaelson smiled at him. “You guys are so full of shit.”

  Hollister nursed a drink as he wrote to Susan. At least now that he had orders to Fort Benning, he could write about something that was forward-looking, hopeful, and concrete.

  It filled the void of pages that had remained unwritten about the ugliness of his days, and he didn’t feel as deceitful about avoiding the details of the carnage for the little things that he and Susan had to discuss about their future.

  Wedding plans. She had asked questions in a letter he had received earlier in the week. What did he want to do? Big family wedding? Just the two of them slipping away? Hollister tried to explain that he really wanted to get on to their lives together as fast as they could.

  He told her that he was reluctant to suggest plans that would delay the time it would take them to get married, get to Fort Benning and set up housekeeping, but he knew that there were very few options. Susan’s father had died just before they met, and her mother was the only family she had left. A big family wedding would be a problem because his family was so large and her mother couldn’t leave New York because of her poor health.

  Hollister left the decision up to Susan but suggested that they just get married in a simple civil ceremony and get to Benning. They could take some time off later and visit Kansas for her to get to know his family better.

  Housing—he thought that they ought to apply for on-post housing. His hours would be brutal at the Ranger Department, and he wanted her to be surrounded with other Army wives rather than being isolated in some neighborhood in Columbus that might not offer the kind of support that living in Army quarters might.

  Work—it was his turn to ask. What did she want to do about her job? They hadn’t talked about it. He hoped that there was something she could find to do that she would enjoy. He told her that at the current rate, he could probably expect to make captain in their first year at Benning. That would mean a sixty-seven dollar a month pay raise—before taxes.

  Dispensing with some of the details and coordination that he could discuss with her, he spent a page telling her how much he missed her and how excited he was becoming over the nearness of his departure date. He had grown comfortable with the thought of being married to her, and that made him even more eager to get home to her.

  As the LRP column of fours came running down the road past the MP company area, they chanted as loud as they could. A couple of the MP’s coming back from the showers gave the LRPs the finger. They were met with boos and catcalls from the LRPs.

  Hollister’s stomach was sour and his head dull from the scotch he had drunk the night before. He tried to convince himself that the evils he had done to his body the night before could be cured by a hard morning run.

  He hoped that he would start feeling better soon. He had a very long day ahead, which would end with him leading the ambush patrol into the AO.

  As they ran, his mind started to reel at the endless list of things he still had to do before they were skids up.

  When the column turned back into the LRP compound, Captain Michaelson, who led the run, brought them to quick-time, halted the detachment, and instructed them to fell out.

  The thirty soldiers who had made it to the PT formation that morning collapsed onto the ground or wandered around bent over at the waist, hands on their hips, trying to get their wind back. Many pulled cigarettes out of their pockets and lit up even though they were in pain and still coughing from the run.

  Theodore started talking about his recent visit to Bangkok, but his first words were met with a barrage of groans and complaints from the others.

  Bernard coughed up something disgusting and spat it out. “Theodore, if I hear one more story about you and the hookers on Pat Pong Road, I’m really gonna puke.” He turned to some of the others standing around, heads thrown back, gasping for air. “Why is it the cherry boys who come back from R and R spend all their time talking about getting laid like they invented it?”

  There was some laughter at Theodore’s expense, but he just shrugged it off. “Okay, okay. I won’t tell y’all, then. Just fuck you guys!”

  Hollister tried to watch Theodore without being noticed. He was hoping that Theodore was getting along better with the others. The fact that they were teasing him without crossing the line was a good sign.

  After breakfast there was plenty still to do. Hollister pulled out his notebook while he lingered over a cup of coffee. He checked the list and looked at his watch. Not all of the items were absolutely essential—they were rechecks of things he had already checked.

  He decided to leave through the orderly room. Inside he found Bernard at the typewriter and Easy hunched over a four-drawer file cabinet.

  Captain Michaelson was in his office talking on the land line to Brigade. He was still in his PT uniform, unshaven, smoking a cigar, with his dusty jungle boots up on his desk.

  “First Sergeant, I’m going out tonight and won’t be back for four days if we don’t get lucky. Are we square?” Hollister asked.

  Easy looked around, his hand holding a place in the files in the second drawer. “About what, Lieutenant?”

  “Do I owe you anything? I hate getting back from the bush only to find out that I’ve missed some fucking suspense date on some form that I didn’t even know existed. Like last time—Vector Control Officer’s Quarterly Report? You know I was really thinking about it, clutching a Claymore detonator in one hand and a bottle of bug juice in the other.”

  “You go on out there and smite the wily Cong and I’ll cover for you, Lieutenant. Can’t have my young warriors worryin’ about the paperwork. That’s why God invented first sergeants. Anyhow, I’m getting pretty good at finding your signature when I need it.”

  “Hope you’re not forging my signature, First Sergeant.”

  “No! Never! I just put the paperwork in Bernard’s in-box with a note that it needs your signature and,” Easy snapped his fingers, “that fast, I have ’em back—signed.”

  Hollister looked at Bernard, who had stopped typing. Realizing that Hollister was looking at the back of his neck, Bernard quickly started typing again—rapidly.

  “Well, I feel a lot better then, Top. Glad to know that the wheels of administration won’t come to a halt while I’m gone.”

  Michaelson stepped out of his office and waited for Hollister and Easy to quit talking. “Once you two have solved all of our problems, may I have a word with the first sergeant?”

  “Oh,” Hollister said, “yessir. Don’t let me hold you up.” He pointed toward the door. “I have plenty to do anyway. So, if you’ll excuse me, sir. I have to check out the chopper rigging.”

  Hollister waited for Michaelson to make some kind of response, but he only smiled and rolled his eyes. Clearly, the captain thought they might find something better to do than bullshit about the paperwork.

  Hollister fingered the cable used to create the anchor ring on the chopper floor. Two loops of three-eighth-inch steel cable were connected to the chopper by double climber’s snap links hooked to the cargo tie-down rings on the decking.

  The snap links were set in opposing bites, their gates opening in different directions. He followed the cabling with his eyes and his fingers until he was sure that there were no crimps or burrs in the spiral wires that made up the cable.

  Satisfied with the cable ring, he inspected the double snap-link connectors that held the rappeling ropes to the ring. Again they were reversed for opposite bites. He snapped each spring-loaded gate to make sure that the springs would hold them closed.

  Attached to the snap links were the rappeling ropes, bent double and hooked to them in the center point on the ropes. The ropes’ free ends were coiled loosely into sandbags. Standing near the open doorways were five ropes, five sandbags.

  Hollister spread the twisted coils of each rope, looking in between the coils for dirt, grit, or signs of damage that might weaken the ropes.

  Allard and Camacho stood by, watching Hollister inspect
the rigging. They were happy to have him double-check their work. No one wanted to step off the skids of the chopper and fell sixty feet to near certain death.

  Hollister was walking back to his hooch, flipping through his notebook, when he heard a jeep approaching. It was driven by an American, but he couldn’t see through the dusty windshield. The front bumper markings identified the jeep as one belonging to the Advisory Team in An Hoa.

  The driver swerved over to Hollister and came to a jerky halt. It was then that Hollister finally recognized Colonel Baird—Colonel Minh’s U.S. advisor.

  Hollister raised his hand to salute, but before he could say anything the colonel was out of his jeep and had his face pushed into Hollister’s.

  “You are just the man I am looking for! Just who in the fuck do you think you are fucking with?!” the colonel yelled.

  Hollister started to ask just what Baud’s problem was but was cutoff.

  “Shut up! I’ll do the talking here. And you can stand there with your goddamn heels locked together until I tell you to stand at ease. You got that, Lieutenant?”

  The blood was pulsing in Hollister’s temples. Again he tried to reply and was cut off.

  “I want to know just what made you think you could come over to my Province Headquarters and decide just how much information you were going to coordinate with my people. You don’t tell us what the hell you are doing, what kind of units you are moving into our area, and you don’t even leave a complete overlay of your control measures! You running your own goddamn war here, Lieutenant? Huh?”

  The colonel waved his finger in Hollister’s face, only a fraction of an inch from his nose, and screamed even louder. “Let me remind you that this is not your country—you got that?”

  Hollister didn’t know what the colonel’s problem was, but he was a second away from knocking him on his ass.

  “Colonel!”

  Hollister and Colonel Baird looked around at Captain Michaelson running toward them from the orderly room. He stopped very close to the colonel and pushed his chin out. “Colonel, if you have a problem—take it up with me. I command this unit, not Lieutenant Hollister. And he works for me—not you!”

  The colonel raised his hand to point at Hollister. “I’ve been told that this man—”

  Michaelson cut him off. “Let’s take this into my office … now, Colonel.”

  The colonel looked at Michaelson, offended by the captain’s insubordinate tone, but decided to go with him to his office.

  Hollister watched them walk toward the orderly room. He knew that all hell was going to break loose once they got inside. Michaelson was known for not letting people mess with his troops, and he was a bulldog when it did happen.

  Hollister finished cleaning his rifle and set it down across the half-filled laundry bag on the floor. Nothing in his hooch was cleaner than the bag.

  He had decided to tear down his field gear completely for the forthcoming patrol. He made the decision because he was concerned about not carrying any more weight than he needed down the rappeling rope, because they would be crossing at least one fast-moving stream, and because a bottle of insect repellent had burst in a side pocket and seeped into the contents of the rucksack.

  The leak meant that some gear inside might be contaminated and that the smell might be a little too much for the field to absorb. He didn’t want to get sick from eating something poisoned by the repellent or get shot by a VC who had homed in on his bug juice.

  Hollister had dumped everything out of his rucksack and spread it out on his cot, field table, and the top of his footlocker. Just as he started to inspect the stack of thirty loaded M-16 magazines, he heard loud talking from the direction of the orderly room. He looked out the door of his hooch.

  Colonel Baird came flying out the orderly room door in a rage. He was threatening Captain Michaelson with going to Michaelson’s commanding general about unprofessional and insubordinate conduct and something about setting an embarrassing example for Vietnamese officers.

  Michaelson stood in the doorway of the orderly room with his hands on his hips and a cigar clenched tightly in his jaw. Michaelson was about as angry as Hollister had ever seen him.

  Colonel Baird got in his jeep and searched in vain for the starter switch up under the dash—above the clutch. Finally finding it, he started the jeep and ground the gears getting it into low.

  Michaelson sarcastically came to attention, cigar still in his mouth, and gave Baird a salute that dripped with disgust, yelling, “Have a very nice day, Colonel,” over the sounds of the racing jeep engine.

  The colonel made a jerky U-turn in the center of the compound and accelerated. But just as he hit second gear, his baseball cap flew off his head and into the backseat of the jeep.

  That broke Michaelson up. He stood on the steps of the orderly room laughing as Easy stepped out.

  Easy broke into a huge grin. “He’s right, you know, Cap’n?”

  Michaelson’s head snapped around to look at Easy. “Right? Right, First Sergeant? That pissant doesn’t have a clue about coordination and behavior. He’d be hard pressed to find his ass with a map and a flashlight!”

  “Not what I meant. He’s right that you ain’t heard the last of this. He’s the type of officer, if the cap’n doesn’t mind me saying so, that’ll spend mosta the rest of his tour over here tryin’ to fuck the cap’n up.”

  Michaelson dropped his chin and looked down at the ground, thinking for a minute. “Well, he better bring his fucking lunch bucket if he’s gonna fuck with me.”

  “I’da told him that, if I’d been asked,” Easy added.

  Michaelson met Easy’s eyes and they both broke up.

  Hollister agreed with Easy. That wasn’t the end of it. He remembered that he had a magazine in his hand, walked back to the cot, sat back down in the folding chair lacing it, and began to check the magazines.

  He stripped the first few rounds out of the magazine and looked down inside. The rounds were oily and clean. No sign of dirt. He pressed down on the top round to test the strength and travel of the spring. It worked smoothly and had plenty of upward pressure. He then raised the magazine to his face and smelled it, looking for any sign of insect repellent. He didn’t know what the bug juice might do to the ammo or the magazine, but he knew he didn’t want to find out on the upcoming patrol.

  Theodore knocked on the frame of Hollister’s hooch. “Sir, Sergeant Davis sent me over with some stuff for you.”

  “Get in here, Theodore,” Hollister answered without stopping his inspection.

  Theodore entered with a case of C rations, a Claymore bag full of det cord, and a second bag with a complete Claymore in it, and a third on his shoulder. He put the first two bags on the field table and dropped the rations on the floor.

  “Chow and demo for you. And wait till you see what else I got, sir.”

  Hollister turned to look. Theodore was proudly holding the M-79 that Hollister had recovered after Lucas was wounded. “Just got it back from Brigade. Bernard told me to tell you that your contact up there said that this is boocoup unauthorized.”

  Hollister took the weapon and looked it over. “Thanks, Theodore.”

  He had always been bothered by the fact that as a platoon leader he was often called upon to mark targets for gunships and tactical air support only to find that he had to either identify a terrain feature for the pilots or give them directions from however far he could throw a smoke grenade. Both systems were too iffy for Hollister.

  His solution was to use the training rounds that were supplied to M-79 grenadiers. On impact they gave off a small amount of yellow smoke. It would give a platoon leader or team leader the reach beyond his throwing ability. The only problem was, the size and length of the M-79 was a little too much for the occasional use it would get.

  The idea came to him when he saw Lucas’s damaged M-79 at the Clearing Station. He thought that chopping it down might solve the bulk problem. The modifications cost him a bottle of bourbon
.

  Hollister turned it over and then held it for balance. The barrel was cut off at the end of the hand grip, the sight was removed, and the stock was cut off just behind the trigger housing. It was short enough to slip into a primitive holster that Hollister had made in the local village.

  For balance, it wasn’t bad. He broke open the shotgunlike chamber and looked down the shortened barrel. It looked okay to him. Closing the barrel, he slipped the weapon into the clumsy-looking holster. It fit snugly and creaked as the new leather swelled to accept the weapon.

  Hollister smiled. “It won’t be as accurate as a regular M-79 is. But it’ll be hell for marking targets.”

  Theodore slipped a third Claymore bag off his shoulder. “Sir, this is filled with practice rounds. Sergeant Davis got ’em from a buddy in Saigon.”

  “Good deal,” Hollister said, looking at Theodore. “You ready to go?”

  Theodore looked up at Hollister as if there was something wrong. “Yessir, why?”

  “Why? Because if you aren’t ready to go, it’s going to be a rough trip,” Hollister said, and then gave Theodore a smile.

  Theodore realized that he wasn’t in trouble and relaxed a bit. “Yessir. I’m ready. Got my shit, ah … I mean my gear, packed already. The radio’s working five by five and I’m ready.”

  “Okay, then do me a favor and help me show the newbies how it’s done out there. I’ll need all the help I can get.”

  Theodore straightened up and pushed his chest out a little. “Yes, sir. You can count on me. I’m on the job.”

  “Okay, then. Thanks for bringing all that gear over.”

  “Oh, no problem, sir. You want me to fill your canteens for you?”

  “No. I’ll take care of it. Thanks again.”

  “Anytime, sir. I, ah … I, ah, better get back to the team hooch.”

  “Okay, Theodore, I’ll see you at chow.”